Trent Lott: “As negotiations dragged on for over 5 years, the marketplace was changing dramatically and rapidly, while the objective…”

“As negotiations dragged on for over 5 years, the marketplace was changing dramatically and rapidly, while the objective of the negotiators seemed to remain static. There was a failure on the part of our negotiators to recognize these changes and the activities of the various participating parties during the negotiations. China, which had no commercial shipbuilding market in 1990, began to target shipbuilding to industrialize its economy. China now ranks third in the world for commercial shipbuilding, and it is not a signatory to this agreement. Other countries, such as the Ukraine and Poland, are also not covered by this agreement and have displayed a renewed interest in their shipbuilding sectors.”